<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>All Coming Together by WowSoBoring</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25422106">All Coming Together</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/WowSoBoring/pseuds/WowSoBoring'>WowSoBoring</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The 5 Timeline [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Community (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alternate Timelines, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Episode: s03e04 Remedial Chaos Theory, Eventual Fluff, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, Feelings Realization, Mutual Pining, Mutually Unrequited, Pining, Requited Unrequited Love, Slow Burn, the 5 timeline</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-21</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 05:15:44</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>12,478</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25422106</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/WowSoBoring/pseuds/WowSoBoring</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Slow burn fiction with eventual Annie and Abed based in the "5" timeline (where Abed goes to get the pizza). Annie is set on a path of realization and discovery when she realizes her dynamic with Jeff is somewhat not all that great.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Annie Edison/Abed Nadir, Slight Troy/Britta but not primarily</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The 5 Timeline [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1859221</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>64</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Pies, Presents, Kisses (stoned, intentions, wrong words)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>- Many lines in this first chapter are from Remedial Chaos Theory for introduction to the premise, the remaining chapters probably won't have this at all since we never really get to see the show from the "5" timeline</p><p>- This starts off with no POV in particular, we have some quick glances at the thoughts of the characters which is then succeeded by Abed's POV (which is super hard to write, just a head's up)</p><p>- As someone who ships multiple couples at the same time (c'mon dude, it's a tv show that's known for exploring dynamics, let's have some fun), I wanted to write a slow burn fic based in the "5" timeline where Jeff and Annie barely look like an option and the group is at odds with each other for some time</p><p>- Since this is a slow burn fic, I won't establish Annie and Abed since the very beginning, first I'll sort out the conflicts and then send Annie on her discovery, also I have to have Annie move into Abed's and Troy's place which I have just the idea for.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Now, how to play Yahtzee…” Troy started reading the instructions at the back of the box with a fake smile plastered across his face.</p><p>“Is there nothing from our youth they won’t repackage for a buck?” Pierce mumbled, “Call it Yahtzee all you want, everyone knows it’s Puerto Rican chess.” He finished his rambling as he rolled his eyes.</p><p>The buzzer buzzed all of a sudden and created a somewhat sudden noise that Annie became extremely startled and gasped rather loudly, scaring everyone else.</p><p>“Annie, it’s just the buzzer” Jeff tried to smile, raising both his eyebrows.</p><p>“It’s the pizza. We can’t buzz him up, someone has to go down.” Abed informed all of them.</p><p>The whole group followed Abed’s hidden cue by instinctively putting their fingers on their noses at the same time.</p><p>“Uh, okay” Jeff rolled his eyes, “starting on my left with 1, your number comes up, you go.”</p><p>“Just so you know Jeff, you are now creating six different timelines.” Abed noted.</p><p>“Of course I am, Abed.” Jeff regarded him with a fake smile.</p><p>Jeff rolled the die as everyone silently hoped they didn’t have to get the pizza as Abed with a frown on his face was counting the number of people on the table and looking at the cubical die skeptically. Before he could deduce anything, the die landed on the table, the number showing up being 5.</p><p>“Five.” Jeff finally said, “one, two, three, four, five- Abed.”</p><p>“I’m on it.” he said quickly, resolving to be as quick as possible so he wouldn’t miss out on much.</p><p>“You know who else was on it and do you know what it is?” Pierce smiled, wiggling his eyebrows.</p><p>“Everybody give me money.” Abed said.</p><p>“Wow, that ascot really softens your personality…” Jeff commented as he reached for his wallet.</p><p>Pierce’s smile faded as he realized no one really heard what he was saying, “I banged Eartha Kitt!” his smile returned.</p><p>Everyone rolled their eyes including Shirley who got up and headed towards the kitchen and Abed who headed on down to get the pizza</p><p>Britta hummed along to a song playing on the radio and chimed in as Sting hit the opening note, “Roxaaaaa-”</p><p>“No” Jeff stopped her from giving him and the rest of the group what could be an ear-soring experience.</p><p>“Bathroom?” she asked Troy, clearly annoyed at Jeff.</p><p>“Down the hall…” Troy provided, regarding her posterior, smiling at himself, as she walked off in a huff.</p><p>“Need to get a drink” Jeff mumbled as he got up from the chair. His head automatically hit the fan on the ceiling as he yelled out in pain which apparently Troy and Pierce found funny.</p><p>“Oh my god, are you okay?” Annie frowned, concerned.</p><p>Jeff winced, “barely felt it.”</p><p>“Well, let me look at it in the bathroom” Annie supplied.</p><p>Troy interrupted them as he remembered who was where, “Britta’s in the bathroom.”</p><p>“Oh, um,” Annie looked around, finally finding the kitchen which also had a sink where she could tend to Jeff. She pointed towards the kitchen as Jeff painfully nodded.</p><p>
  <b>Kitchen</b>
</p><p>“Oh no, what happened? ” Shirley said when she noticed Jeff and Annie come in.</p><p>“Minor head wound” Annie confided, smiling awkwardly.</p><p>Meanwhile in the distance, Jeff, Annie and Shirley could make out Britta’s distinct voice, “Oh my god, what smells amazing?”</p><p>“Oh! Someone wants pie!” Shirley shrieked, following the direction of Britta’s voice, leaving Annie alone to take care of Jeff’s wound.</p><p>“You make a good nurse.” Jeff smiled at her fondly.</p><p>“Thanks…” Annie blushed, her cheeks flushed, “I was just applying a tourniquet the other day. Guy got stabbed outside my building.”</p><p>“Annie, you have to move out of there.” Jeff said lightly with an air of concern in his voice.</p><p>“You don’t have to treat me like a kid anymore. Remember?” Annie reminded him lightly.</p><p>“Well, adults still need to be protected.” Jeff rolled his eyes, “I can’t help but worry about you, Annie” Jeff added gently, his gaze dropping downward towards her lips. “You’re very important to me” he said more softly as Annie found herself gazing intently at him. Before either of them could think, Jeff started leaning in as the same time as Annie whose eyes were slowly fluttering shut. Their lips met in a soft kiss. Nothing seemed to matter to each of them anymore as they continued. Annie lightly smiling and Jeff finding his way down to her hips. Unfortunately for them, their respiratory tracts had other plans which led them to pull away for catching some breath.</p><p>Jeff’s eyes closed again as he started to lean in. Oh this could easily turn into something more. Before he could, though, Annie seemed to have remembered something.</p><p>“I’m sorry, I just had this weird déjà vu.” She smiled uncertainly. “What you said about worrying about me? Something my dad always said.” Annie chuckled</p><p>Jeff’s smile slowly faded.</p><p>“Shouldn’t have brought it up.” she chuckled, blushing. “Just reminded me of my dad. Anyway-” she leaned in.</p><p>“Uh, just a little Make Out 101.  Less dad talk and you could ease off on the bubblegum lip gloss.” he said, annoyed now.</p><p>“Hmm.” Annie said, looking a little hurt. Eventually, a frown developed on her face as she actually considered why she mentioned her dad at such an inappropriate time in such an inappropriate context.</p><p>Eventually both came out of the kitchen, Annie frowning and Jeff shuddering</p><p>
  <b>Outside the bathroom</b>
</p><p>After smoking a little pot, Britta was satisfied and decided to come back out before anyone got suspicious. She observed an amazing smell of something fresh baked and amazing so she said loudly than she anticipated, “Oh my god, what smells amazing?”</p><p>She heard Shirley’s distinct voice as she came towards her, “ooh, someone wants pie!”. Shirley offered Britta a mini pie which she gladly took.</p><p>“Oh, my god. They taste just like regular sized pies!” Britta exclaimed, smacking her lips and giggling giddily.</p><p>“Oh, yay!” Shirley smiled as if her day had just been made but slowly her smile started to fade. “Sometimes I feel like baking desserts is the only thing I’m good for in the group.” she mumbled sadly.</p><p>Britta started frowning, trying to remember something, something which was along the same lines as what Shirley had just confided in her…“Oh, crap! I was not supposed to eat your stuff! We all made an agreement.” she said.</p><p>Shirley looked at her with disbelief and disappointment in her eyes. Oblivious, Britta proceeded to remember yet another detail.</p><p>“Crap, I was not supposed to say that out loud.” Britta said, freaking out. “Crap, cards on the table, I’m really high right now.” Britta confided.</p><p>“Oh!” Shirley shrieked, not knowing what to do with such feedback, her eyes shone with disapproval and anger mixed with a pinch of sadness. She decided to let her anger and disapproval show. “I can’t believe I’m feeding my pies to a drug addict!”</p><p>“Drug addict” Britta yelled, her tiny face scrunched up in a frown, “You’re a pie pusher!” she accused, “you push pies to get love!”</p><p>Shirley gasped in disbelief. She snatched the pie from Britta’s hands. “Give me this! You godless hippie skank!” she yelled. Britta gasped, very much taking offense at Shirley’s words.</p><p>As they both saw Abed come in, they angrily joined the rest of the group in the dining table where Troy angrily glared at Pierce and Jeff and Annie couldn’t even bear to look at each other.</p><p>
  <b>In the dining room</b>
</p><p>“Happy housewarming!” Pierce said to Troy as he produced a package from under the table. Troy smiled at Pierce, clearly happy at having received a present.</p><p>“Oh, cool. Thanks, Pierce!” he smiled. “Hey, while we’re alone, I just wanted to say thanks for letting me live with you. But now it’s time for me to make it on my own, just like you did.” he said, a grateful expression residing in his face as he finally started to believe that maybe Pierce could be a good person despite the whole LeVar Burton thing. Maybe, Pierce had changed.</p><p>Pierce smiled, clearly flattered by Troy’s little thank-you but quickly realized what he was about to give Troy and the actual intentions behind it. After Troy had been such a good lad, giving him that would just make Pierce a bigger dick. Since summer, Pierce had been trying to come across as a good person but Troy moving out and into Ay-bed’s place sparked a sense of jealousy. Why did the weird Arab guy get a best friend and not him? Now what Troy said and the way he said it genuinely provoked Pierce’s microscopic conscience. Troy could not get that gift.</p><p>“Don’t open this.” he lightly chuckled.</p><p>“No- what?” Troy chuckled. This was not going to be easy.</p><p>“Let me give you something else” Pierce offered. “ A waterpik, a speedboat…” Pierce looked for more compelling things, “uh, two waterpiks!”</p><p>It didn’t work.</p><p>“Give it Pierce!” Troy said forcefully, a slight amount of anger and a major sense of annoyance is his tone. “It feels fun!”.</p><p>“Stop it!” Pierce attempted to snatch the box but Troy was stronger. “You’re bad at gift-giving!” he yelled, almost completely successful. “I demand to be housewarmed!” Troy yelled again, applying yet more force. “No, I reall-”</p><p>The box eventually toppled upwards and its content flew off, right to their computer.</p><p>It was the troll doll. The terrifying troll doll that used to terrorize Troy in his dreams, the one that used to stare at him with those evil eyes while he was trying to sleep. He knew there was something freaky with that doll and seeing it in his house, what if it infested his house with itself? Troy glared at the doll, unable to say anything. Unable to express how disappointed he was in Pierce or how scared he was of that horrifying thing without Jeff making fun of him for being scared. He had no words.</p><p>Pierce looked back at Troy, apologetically with regret. This was a clear mistake. Now Troy would eventually say this to everyone and lo and behold, the exclusion will start again. They’d start going on gayer trampolines and playing Dungeons and Dragons with fatter kids while he’d be at home, with his miserable fortune, just feeling kind of empty inside.</p><p>“You’re a sick, sad old man and I hope you die alone.” Troy muttered.</p><p>And just then Abed walked in. As Britta huffed at Shirley and Annie frowned looking at the very opposite direction from Jeff’s, he, oblivious, grabbed a slice of pizza and started to enjoy.</p><p>“I wonder what happened in those other timelines.” he said after taking a bite. “I hope this is the real one since I found a nickel in the hallway.”</p><hr/><p>
  <b>Abed</b>
</p><p>It didn’t take Abed too long to find out the fact that something was really off. He frankly wasn’t interested in going down to get the pizza. After realizing that Jeff, that conniving son of a bitch, ensured that he never had to get the pizza, he really felt like calling him out but now that the die had been rolled and everybody was looking at him expectantly, he couldn’t. He was striving to be a perfect host this evening and he didn’t want anything to tamper that. After reading the section on that 40s manual on how to be a good host, he was getting some grip on reading the room. He decided to bring Jeff’s little plan up while they were indulging in a light-hearted game of Yahtzee as Troy and he had planned and they could punish him in some fun way like forcing him to wear something funny and tweet out a picture of it. He smiled at that thought.</p><p>The pizza delivery guy seemed weird but that’s what he’d noticed in most pizza guys. His facial hair seemed to bother Abed’s insides. Almost as much as how much it seemed to bother him when Annie characteristically made googly eyes at Jeff. Well, that didn’t bother him, per se. He just wasn’t able to figure out how Annie couldn’t move on from the time when Jeff kissed her in the Transfer Formal after two years but seemed to be completely over Abed in no time. Regardless, he didn’t care, it would be too out of character.</p><p>Their kiss was the heat of the moment and if it did lead to something, it would shift the whole paradigm of how the group functioned. Being the quiet observationalist of the group and the comic relief of the show (he was well aware that it wasn’t a show, TV talk just made it easier for him to form analogies) there was nothing bound to happen between Annie and him. It’d be different and even if something happened, that “something” would be a distraction, just a way for her to realize that Abed was an obstacle for her on her way to finding love with Jeff. It was too obvious.</p><p>She was only into him, Abed, when he wasn’t being him, Abed. Abed wasn’t Han Solo, he wasn’t a hero, he knew Jeff was going to instinctively slouch into that role so he snatched it. Flirting with Annie who automatically became Leia was something he may or may not have seen coming. Abed wasn’t Don Draper either, he had absolutely no regard for being an infidel, sure Draper was “cool” but Abed wasn’t aspiring to be Don Draper under any circumstances. He wasn’t going to change his whole persona to fluster Annie but the more he’d being saying that to himself, the less preposterous it felt. Annie would eventually get with Jeff which would be the ideal scenario, the sensible scenario. The scenario that legitimately seemed to make some sense.</p><p>As he reached his floor, he saw something glint in the hallway right outside his apartment. Ooh, a nickel! That seemed intriguing. He was no Ted Mosby but he did have to admit that this discovery made him happy considering he hadn’t ever seen a nickel in his life before.</p><p>He made that introspective inner monologue skid to a halt as he entered his apartment. Good hosts always paid the utmost attention to the events they were hosting.</p><p>***</p><p>When he entered, he was too absorbed in his thoughts and the nickel to notice anything different. It took him a few minutes to notice everything wrong. The troll doll on that wooden desk was the first thing he noticed. He’d heard a lot about that troll doll from Troy. Troy recounted many tails of being mortified of that artifact, Troy even thought it had something to do with the supernatural. He noticed a package that the troll doll must’ve been in residing in Pierce’s arm. Aha, Pierce gave Troy that as a mean spirited present out of jealousy, a surge of anger went through his body but he didn’t characterize it, because before he could, his sight shifted to Britta and Shirley who were frowning at each other too.</p><p>It took him slightly longer to figure this one out. The mini pie in Shirley’s hands was half eaten and after squinting towards Britta while she wasn’t looking, he found pie crumbs. So Britta broke the agreement by having the pie and she must’ve disclosed it by mistake. She basically britta’d the whole thing when she could’ve just stayed quiet and swallowed it or said that she was having a stomach ache of sorts after a bite. Abed was still feeling that something was fishy, though, Britta was never this clumsy. Perhaps she was indulging in alcohol or marijuana. He nodded. That also seemed to explain the part where she called his model from Raiders, “super sexy cool” while Annie said that she was overselling something.</p><p>Then his eyes found their way to where Jeff and Annie were. They weren’t exactly fuming at each other. The both of them seemed to not even be able to meet each other’s eyes as if something awkward had happened between them. He couldn’t fin- oh there it was. Jeff’s lips were shining of a slightly pink lip gloss which they weren’t earlier which he could distinctly notice on Annie’s lips too. So, they shared a romantic moment and even kissed. But then why were they mad at each other.</p><p>After somewhat solving those mysteries, his pride over his analytical prowess gave way to anger. Something more than Annie yelling at him when he waited for 26 hours for a psych experiment that never happened. They seemed to have no respect for his and Troy’s big night. All they could do was have petty rows over tiny things and use a housewarming party to be the perfect night to start a relationship that didn’t even seem like it was going to happen from the looks of Jeff and Annie and the way they were regarding each other. Sure, that was perfectly in character to how the group worked but on his housewarming party? He sensed something totally unfair in this and that’s one of the very few things Abed hated. After striving hard to be a perfect host and trying to read the room and whatnot, the study group (excluding Troy) just couldn’t get rid of their sense of disharmony for one night. Annoyed, he broke the silence…</p><p>“Thanks. This has been a pleasure.” he saw Annie look at him raising an eyebrow, “oh, that was me being sarcastic since I actually have little to no idea how to react to this situation” he continued, “I meant to say, thanks for being yourselves tonight. Thanks for giving my best friend the thing he’s mortified of,” he said eyeing Pierce, “thanks for just messing the easiest things up by not resisting the urge to get high” he regarded Britta, “and for the last, thanks for choosing this night that I thought was about Troy and I and making it about yourselves,” he pointed towards Jeff and Annie. “Sarcasm aside, I just wanted you guys to let today be amazing and it seemed like it was going well but today’s not some puppy parade day. Today is a day that marks something important in my life and Troy’s life. Something I thought was so important, I made up a fake postcard so that Jeff wouldn’t characteristically blow it off, but as it turns out, it wasn’t worth it.” Abed finished his long monologue which he was somewhat proud of.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. Conflict Resolution and Emotional Analysis</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>Jeff's POV with his insight on previous monologue from Abed from the last chapter<br/>Troy's POV where he thinks about the housewarming party.<br/>Britta's POV where she gets over her guilt and the group is reunited again thanks to Dean Pelton.<br/>Annie's POV, insight, pining and the group's back together. Abed asks Annie to move in after she confides in him about her neighborhood.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This chapter starts out kind of sad but ends happily :)</p><p>(also since this is canon divergence and since this is the 5 timeline where things are different, premises will be different for example I'd have to write in Annie moving in to Troy and Abed's and Troy and Britta will start dating in a different premise)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <h3>Jeff</h3><p>After hearing Abed finish his monologue, Jeff didn’t know how to react. First, that guy was a literal magician, like how did he know what was going on behind his back? It took him two minutes to just look at everyone’s faces and deduce correctly whatever had happened.</p><p>This was a new achievement for the study group and not in a good way. This was a new low. He certainly hadn’t been expecting to kiss Annie tonight and he enjoyed doing it, until she opened her cute little mouth and gave out a cute little chuckle and said words that totally contradicted the whole concept of what ‘cute’ was supposed to mean.</p><p>No one wanted to hear that after a make out session and Jeff was sure this time, making out could lead to something more. Unlike the transfer formal, he wasn’t planning on holding back. And then she said he reminded her of her dad and it was just gone. The attraction. The fantasy. It fell down to the floor and broke into a million shards and he hoped that happened for her too, judging by her expression, she felt the same way too. Why would she say that unless it wasn’t true?</p><p>And he couldn’t even afford to be offended by Abed’s somewhat accusatory tone and accusatory words because yes, he did subconsciously make their night about himself. He could’ve controlled himself but then again, when there’s electricity, people seem to get lost in the moment. What he didn’t like was how Abed seemed to perceive him. Jeff was the only one they had to bend over backwards for and photoshop a postcard for so that he wouldn’t blow their important night off and even then he’d create some sort of problem in the night. Yes, the Britta-Shirley row and the Pierce-Troy rift was also there but he did contribute to the trouble too and he had been wanting to get rid of this sort of perception of him lately. He’d already freaked the whole group out after the whole chopping study table with axe incident which showed he cared too much. Now he cared too little. What happened to just being, ‘cool’?</p><p>Regardless, no one said anything. Abed went to his room, closing the door behind him. Troy sulked angrily and glared at everyone being the only one who completely agreed with Abed and the only one Abed didn’t seem disappointed in apart from Shirley who also technically didn’t start anything.</p><p>It was a new low. Disappointing Abed was something to Jeff that seemed impossible maybe because he didn’t think Abed was one to get disappointed in things easily.</p><p>Troy was the one to break the silence. “Well, this was fun,” he said with a half heart. “Imma head out for the night. See y’all on Monday.”</p><p>“Troy, we’re–” Annie started, softly.</p><p>“Yeah, okay, whatever, I’m inclined to agree with the person who’s right. Bye.” he said as he closed the door shooting a menacing look at Pierce.</p><p>Annie made a face indicating a major amount of sadness and guilt. Apparently, having Abed disappointed in her was more rough for her than it was for him. He knew that Annie couldn’t bear to have any of her friends think about her in a disapproving way.</p><p>They all proceeded to vacate apartment 303, a place that looked pretty sick and cozy to begin with but was now tainted with a hint of toxicity.</p><p>As Jeff gradually reached home, Todd’s words rang in his years, “your love is weird and toxic and destroys everything it touches!”</p><p>Jeff sincerely hoped that wasn’t true. Hell, he’d do anything to make sure that wasn’t true but for now, he was too glum to even check the number of likes he had on his latest tweet from this morning.</p><p> </p><hr/><h3>Troy</h3><p> </p><p>The evening seemed promising to Troy. Abed and he had put up with Shirley for hours and keeping the whole agreement thing to himself was rather hard. Eh, it was all gonna be worth it for the evening, right? Wrong! The worst part was that at the end of Abed’s awesome (but kind of sad) monologue, he didn’t feel the need to reassure Abed and ask him to come out or something (and he was far too disheartened to even consider how dope Abed’s predictions had been as he took a glance at Jeff’s pink glossy lips and Annie’s pink glossy lips). Why? Abed was right. They had been bending over backwards to make sure everything went smooth and however awesome it would’ve been for Jeff to make out with Annie, not cool to do it during their housewarming party. Heck, he wanted to make a move on Britta too but he didn’t for the sanctity of this awesome day.</p><p>And then, Pierce. That guy was straight up nuts! Like what was wrong with him? Like seriously who does that? That guy was the pettiest, most mean spirited and sad old man he’d ever met. He’d been prepared to think that Pierce could be awesome after he defeated City College but some people never change, apparently. To be fair, Pierce didn’t feel like giving the gift to him but it was only because Troy was being sweet, like he always is to Pierce regularly. Ah, that jealous old man, he couldn’t believe how he forgot about the time where he tried to buy their handshake.</p><p>He couldn’t understand the deal with Jeff and Annie though. If they made out, that was a good thing right? They couldn’t even look at each other. That was straight up weird. He also couldn’t really gloss over the way Abed was looking at Annie as he was saying us deductions out loud. He looked more disappointed than he did on Pierce or Britta. Usually it’s difficult to tell these feelings for others but with Abed, even a distinct shift in tone could mean that he was going through something. A small quirk of lips or eyes that looked shiny, like a mirror. Like it took all his willpower to not let his eyes well up so that he’d cry. Thank god Abed didn’t cry or something. Troy wouldn’t want to have to do anything with something that made <em>Abed</em> Cry. After the psych experiment from two years ago and the things Britta told Troy that Meghan said to Abed last year or even that librarian turning him down during Valentine’s Day because he was weird, none of that made Abed cry but it made Troy bawl.</p><p>There was something he saw in Abed’s eyes as he looked at Annie after he concluded they made out.</p><p>Troy wasn’t one to notice mood changes and dynamic shifts. He was a person who could sense change in emotions.</p><p>Strong emotions.</p><p>Strong emotions that Abed perhaps had for Annie.</p><p>Or maybe he was reading too deep into it for the sake of feeling smart…</p><p>“Hey, uh-Abed?” Troy started.</p><p>“Yep?”</p><p>“Is there anything you wanna tell me?”</p><p>“In what way?”</p><p>“Do you like Annie?”</p><p>“Do you like Britta?”</p><p>“I can’t confirm or deny that”</p><p>“Right back atcha.”</p><p>And just like that, the magician who was Abed Nadir had distracted Troy to think about Britta.</p><p>That girl was a hurricane.</p><p>He smiled.</p><p> </p><hr/><h3>Britta</h3><p> </p><p>
  <em> <span class="u">Monday morning</span> </em>
</p><p>Britta felt bad. She should’ve decided to get high another time. This was clearly getting out of hand. She started considering Todd’s words to be kind of true and that gave her shudders. Abed was right, though. She shouldn’t have smoked weed just then. Should’ve waited till she got home. She really was the worst, she thought, as she sadly walked in the study room as she saw Jeff come in from the other side and nodded in acknowledgement.</p><p>The group wasn’t completely at odds with each other. They all wanted to apologize to Troy and Abed who both seemed equally disappointed in them but were themselves as good friends as ever. Those two really lived in their own world.</p><p>Annie was reading the chapter about Darwin and whatever he discovered and philosophized. Abed and Troy were whispering at each other. Pierce was pretending to be tech savvy by using a calculator for some reason, Shirley was noting a few things down and Jeff was checking out his text messages. They couldn’t even bring themselves to talk to each other at this point of time and that was just, bad.</p><p>Getting lost in her thoughts, she thought about the housewarming party. She remembered staring at Troy intently when he wasn’t looking and remembered the happy feeling she got as she puffed a smoke and that amazing smell of fresh baked pies that Shirley made and it felt like heaven. The pies tasted amazing. And then she remembered she messed up everything. And then Shirley called her a “godless hippie skank” which offended her and then Abed walked in with the pizza. He was oblivious to everything to such a degree that she wished she got the pizza instead (on second thought, she was already high, she didn’t want to do something weird like get engaged to the creepy pizza guy or something) but then Abed found everything out by just looking at them. That did seem pretty cool but at that time with his monologue she was too busy feeling endlessly guilty.</p><p>The door opened only to reveal the Dean come in wearing a hot dog costume for some reason.</p><p>“Hey, favorite study group” he chuckled</p><p>They acknowledged him.</p><p>He chuckled before observing everyone’s demeanor, “uh, what happened here guys?”</p><p>No one responded.</p><p>“Uh, whatever, so I need you guys to um, help me out, we are having a fundraiser for raising money so that puppies could get prosthetic paws and we’ll have a hot dog fest!”</p><p>Everyone except Annie and Shirley groaned.</p><p>“You guys will get more pizza for the next month!”</p><p>Everyone’s eyes lit up finally. Abed and Troy smiled.</p><p>So did Britta. This could be an opportunity for things to go back to normal.</p><p>“Happy fun-dean!” the Dean said after which he walked away.</p><p>“I have a feeling he only asked us to help because he wanted to crack that terrible pun.”</p><p>Everyone chuckled. Jeff smiled</p><p>(Britta could feel things go back to normal)</p><p>“Guys, who are we kidding, we can’t stay mad at each other.” Jeff said</p><p>Everyone agreed, saying “yes”, “yeah” “sounds about right” and so it was solved.</p><p>“And we’re sorry Abed and Troy, we should’ve been behaving better during your housewarming party.” Annie said.</p><p>“Yeah, I’m really sorry.” Jeff chimed in.</p><p>“Me too” Britta said, smiling at Troy who smiled back, giving her a surge of serotonin go through her veins.</p><p>Troy and Abed shared a look of agreement.</p><p>“We accept” both said at the same time. Troy started smiling at Britta first this time and she couldn’t resist the urge to decide that she was going to ask him out today. She was a strong and bold woman. Not some blushy and shy girl.</p><p>“I’m really sorry, Troy. Here, maybe this will make it up to you.” Pierce said.</p><p>“What is this?” Troy looked skeptically. “Oh Pierce! Is this a signed photo of LeVar Burton?”</p><p>“The one and only”</p><p>“Pierce, this is awesome! Thanks!”</p><p>Britta smiled as she observed everyone smiling at each other and felt particularly wholesome but then something distracted her. It was Annie. Looking intently at Abed for some reason. Had she gotten over Jeff or something? Or was she still sorry. She had no idea.</p><p>As everyone was leaving for breakfast, she asked Annie</p><p>“Hey, uh-Annie?” Britta started.</p><p>“Yep?”</p><p>“Is there anything you wanna tell me?”</p><p>“In what way?”</p><p>“Do you like Abed?”</p><p>“Do you like Troy?”</p><p>“I can’t confirm or deny that”</p><p>“Right back atcha.”</p><p>She blushed as she left the room. Britta looked behind her and she was appalled at finding out that Troy was still playing a game on his phone. He’d heard her conversation. Before she could say anything, he looked up at her.</p><p>“You know, it’s funny, Abed and I had the same discussion on our housewarming party and he reacted the exact same way.” He wiggled his eyebrows</p><p>Britta didn’t know what to do with that but that also mean that Abed asked Troy if he liked her. She smiled lightly. “I was thinking,” she said in a soft tone, “do you wanna grab a drink at Starbucks after?”</p><p>“Yes, I’d love to.” Troy smiled.</p><p>They went to have breakfast while Britta was internally jumping around in happiness</p><p> </p><hr/><h3> Annie</h3><p> </p><p>Things had changed for Annie recently. Not little but a lot. Since the housewarming party, she’d successfully gotten over Jeff Winger and she could not say for sure that she was lying when she said what she said after making out. And it felt wrong and gross and she hoped that this didn’t happen in the “other timelines” but strangely, she was over it.</p><p>Something changed.</p><p>A new obsession had entered her brain. A new addiction. A new thing that when she thought about made her smile but then made her tear up sometimes. She was pretty sure she won’t be able to follow through.</p><p>As Abed was giving his insights on the situation and looked at her disapprovingly, she was hurt. Hurt in a different way. He was looking at her disapprovingly in a different way. His caramel brown eyes portrayed hurt, more than anything. For Britta and Pierce, it was just a frustrating eye roll if you squinted. For her, she noticed something more, a silent question, “why?”. And she knew that probably wasn’t true and she was reading too much into it. She was no Abed.</p><p>And then she reached home, not crying, but she had a certain air of melancholy about her. Britta didn’t try to console her as she drove her given that she was pretty upset too. So she reached home, not knowing what to do. She didn’t know how to cheer herself up so she decided to read her journal from the last semester. She had journal where she recorded the happiest memories of each day of school (community college) and so she started in the last page. Little did she know what she had coming.</p><p>The last page of the last semester was paintball. The Han and Leia one. The one she had to force herself to forget because if she professed her genuine feelings on the same, they’d not be returned. In Abed’s eyes probably, she liked bad guys. Jeff. Han Solo. Don Draper. So he’d start role-playing sometimes, with seemingly innocent intentions and then something would happen between them. But he would only be doing those things and showing her his attraction because he was being in character. Why did it always feel so genuine? How did he mimic the fictional characters with such emotion, with just expressively lustful eyes? Could someone actually fake that unless they were a professional actor?</p><p>Goosebumps ran through her body as she read how she described that kiss under the raining paint in the most intricate way. Down to how their hands moved and how their eyes closed and how he turned her around and how she wrapped her arm around his neck and how she clung onto him as he gently held her waist as his velvety soft lips tasting of nutmeg and cinnamon were on hers. There was something in that kiss and there was something in Abed, not Han Solo, that made her remember compulsively that whole memory. Maybe Han Solo!Abed’s distinctive voice did additional things to her but that was it. She was certainly sure she didn’t have feelings for that elf maiden that day either and as much as she wished that that role-play sex was just for winning the game but it just wasn’t true.</p><p>***</p><p>
  <em> <span class="u">Night after housewarming party</span> </em>
</p><p>
  <em> <span class="u">7 pm</span> </em>
</p><p>The group had been reunited this morning and Abed volunteered to help her arrange her new shelf. He seemed concerned about her living condition and she was there for it. As they were done, Abed sat down, tired. It was apparently too late at 7 pm and time had flown. He had been planning on watching a certain murder mystery movie but now he couldn’t but much to Annie’s happiness, he didn’t complain when she said she had the same movie downloaded in her laptop. They watched the movie and as the movie went on, Annie kept getting scared as women and men screamed when they found out that the killer had caught them. She gripped Abed and he didn’t complain. “Let’s watch something different.” he said when he saw her almost cry. They put on a romantic movie next and as the whole concept of unrequited love was introduced made her get goosebumps which were scarier than the ones she got from the previous movie. She gripped him again. He didn’t complain. “Sorry.” she said, “kind of personal” she chuckled sadly. “Same” he said, understandingly. She looked him straight in his eye and he looked back. She knew what that meant. She leaned in and kissed him. As him. He kissed her back. It started soft but turned passionate and she was planning on letting his tongue slip through when she heard a loud thud from the apartment below and opened her eyes.</p><p>And woke up from her sleep.</p><p>Quite a dream...</p><p>"This better not awaken anything in me..." she muttered to herself.</p><p>***</p><p>
  <span class="u"> <em>Monday</em> </span>
</p><p>The study group was finally together. Well it had only been a few days but still, it felt nice.</p><p>She found herself eyeing Abed and studying him again as they exchanged sorries and Britta knew something. When she pulled her aside and asked her the question, “do you like Abed?” she didn’t know what to do so she twisted things around from what she’d been noticing lately between Britta and Troy.</p><p>***</p><p>
  <span class="u"> <em>Wednesday</em> </span>
</p><p>
  <span class="u"> <em>Said hot-dog fundraiser</em> </span>
</p><p>It had been amazing that day. They’d managed to sell a lot of hot dogs and even though the whole reason behind this fundraiser was to rub it in City College’s face, Annie always felt happy doing things for a good cause.</p><p>“Hey.” Abed said as she was winding up her stall.</p><p>“Hey!” she replied, upbeat.</p><p>“I noticed something I wanted to ask you about”</p><p>“Yeah! What is it?”</p><p>“What’s up with you and Jeff. You guys clearly kissed. Why were you mad at each other?”</p><p>As much as voicing the reason felt unnecessary and something she never wanted to say out loud she did.</p><p>“The dynamic was wrong.”</p><p>“Age difference is garbage in my opinion.”</p><p>“No, the dynamic…”</p><p>Abed’s knowledge on TV was enough and she was glad about that. She really didn’t want to get into it. He shuddered.</p><p>“How did you find out?”</p><p>Annie told him all about Jeff worrying about where she lived as she was taking care of his wounded head and then one thing lead to another.</p><p>“I mean, even though it was creepy, Annie…you really shouldn’t be living there” he said, normally concerned. “You should move in with Troy and I. We have two bedrooms and the apartment is spacey in general.” he said it like the sky was blue. Jeff cared, Abed offered (but then again Jeff probably didn’t have a spacey apartment hearing from what Britta told her about it).</p><p>So she said “yes” like the sky was blue.</p><p>And then a girl walked up to Abed.</p><p>“Still on for tomorrow?” she asked, blushing.</p><p>“Yep. For sure.” he nodded.</p><p>He turned towards Annie, “we bonded over commentary on whatever was happening in this fundraiser” he informed her.</p><p>She nodded knowingly. “That’s good for you” she said, teeth gritted.</p><p>Inside her head, all she could do was scream “why?!”</p><p>She wanted to have that dream come true. But how?</p><p>She blinked back her incoming tears.</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>also if you read the note at the top, sike!!!!<br/>(sorry, I'm promising a happy ending, that's my whole plan)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Can Dreams Come True?</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>So Annie is sad and wistful and Abed has fun (for a while). Things get interesting when Abed comes home with a huge sad expression on his face</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Only Abed's and Annie's POV which is what i'll be focusing on from now on.<br/>yeah so, the vision I have is pretty sick, I guess. I just need time portraying it.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <h3>Abed</h3><p>
  <em>A month after Annie moves in</em>
</p><p>Recently, Abed had been doing considerably well. He had been able to move on from that housewarming party after realizing that it was still always going to be the study group and most of the members were too old to change for the better. They may fight from time to time but they’re always going to come back to each other in the end and that however sad it sounded occasionally, it was always a comforting notion.</p><p>There had been that two day phase where he was kind of conflicting his feelings about Annie but that phase was over when he met Stacey. Before that, he’d been dealing with something pretty new. He knew he’d never had conflicting feelings for anything. Things were always black and white for him when it came to how he felt about those things. If things didn’t check either box, he was bound to break. However, after watching enough movies and spending enough time with people the past almost three years, he knew that conflicting feelings exist for other people especially those who you’ve had a past with so this time, he didn’t freak.</p><p>Annie always seemed like a nice person to him. Not always a viable romantic prospect but thinking about it never hurt him. Instead, it made him muse. Annie was beautiful and she was also nice and that was a tough combination to receive in the world. Kissing her felt good. Her tiny arms splattered with paint felt good around his arms. Her soft, luscious lips that tasted of bubblegum lip gloss felt amazing. But they were just role-playing. If Abed couldn’t role-play properly, he ought not to do it and since he didn’t want to reach that particular conclusion (since role-playing was quite fun) he just neglected his feelings for long enough and then he moved on like he saw Annie did.</p><p>He didn’t feel it would take Annie such a short span of time to move on from him to Jeff but maybe she was better at role-playing and getting lost in the act more than she let on. Maybe she was flustered at first but then she thought about it for a second and decided it was best if she moved on.</p><p>Then he met Stacey. She was nice. She was similar to him in most ways but a little more emotionally stable and quite sarcastic (which made commenting on whatever was going on in the hot-dog fest much more fun). She was quite pretty too. He really enjoyed talking about her to the group but recently, he felt like she was getting really flustered by someone else and that just frankly made him feel hurt. To be a good boyfriend, however, meant being trustworthy and so he didn’t doubt her.</p><p>Ever since Annie moved in, it had been fun. He felt like a nice human being after doing that. He felt like someone who cared and could be finally at one with others. He didn’t like the fact that she was living somewhere where she could be harmed and he definitely couldn’t sleep after hearing that ever so he did  the only thing he deemed fit. Without asking Troy, he asked her to move in. She said “yes” so quickly that he was surprised. He was used to people chuckling and being all “yeah, right.” when he offered help but much to his happiness, Annie noticed and appreciated him. It wasn’t hard at all to get Troy on board with Annie moving in. All he had to do was tell him that Annie applied a tourniquet to a guy who got stabbed outside her building and Troy said, “she can’t live there.” Abed replied, “yeah, obviously. We have an extra bedroom, though, what if she moves in here”. “Yeah, that’d work” Troy smiled.</p><p>Recently, he’d stopped mentioning Stacey that often, not because he was a little skeptical about how strongly she felt about him in return but because he certainly noticed Annie’s expression whenever he brought her up. Gritted teeth and balled up fists. A fake “aww”. There was something up with her. He just asked her for a graphite lead and her cheeks turned bright pink. It was weird. Because it meant she suddenly felt things for him. That couldn’t be true. Why would a pretty nice girl who lusted after bad boys feel things for Abed? Abed, himself, only had a few good qualities. He felt he was loyal, fond, caring and was willing to change as a person if there was something problematic with him but then again, he was emotionally unavailable, categorized as a nerd and was always unable to read the room. Maybe Annie saw all those good things too.</p><p>Regardless, he was already dating someone and he didn’t want to mess that up all over something he merely speculated. So when Shirley asked him whether he was taking that girl to the dance, he said yes. And then he saw Annie question it all for some reason. He chided himself. He was already with someone and unless that relationship with someone was faulty, he wasn’t going to do anything with Annie. He wasn’t some infidel.</p><p>And so Troy and he left while Annie and Britta were to have some sort of conversation on their way home.</p><p>“Can I just say ‘hi’ to Stacey for a sec. She’s in the biology room today? You should say ‘hi’ too, she’s nice.” he told Troy.</p><p>“Sure.” Troy smiled.</p><p>And as he went to the biology room and opened the door, he saw Stacey kissing a certain someone he’d recently seen her get flustered by. Troy’s smile faded as Stacey broke apart from the kiss as she stared at Troy and Abed in horror, pushing that guy away. “I’m so sorry, Abed. I swea–”</p><p>“Yeah, sounds about right!” Troy yelled, crying, “how dare you?” he yelled a bit more.</p><p>“That means it’s over, Stacey” Abed said, shooting her an icy look.</p><p>“Let’s go Abed. Let’s get away from this [redacted] [redacted] [redacted]”</p><p>“Yeah, I think that’s best.”</p><p> </p><hr/><p> </p><h3>Annie</h3><p>
  <em>A month after Annie moves in</em>
</p><p>Annie was in the study room with the rest, it was self-study time and they were all silently doing their pending homework so that they could chill when they got home. Annie, was however only pretending to study. She had a random page open in her English textbook and she’d pretend to turn the pages. She was too lost in her thoughts.</p><p>It was amazing living with Abed and Troy. She loved it. There had been a little problem with something called a Dreamatorium which they weren’t willing ti give up under any circumstances because of which she would have to live in a blanket fort in the living room. She gave them an ultimatum, they moved their bunk bed to the blanket fort and offered her the room their bunk bed used to be. She was touched. She never knew her two friends who lived in their own world could be so genuinely sweet. Well, from time to time they’d create a mess of the house but they always tried their level best to clean it up. From time to time, they’d make her feel like a princess and perform some shadow puppetry just to make her smile and she truly felt special there.</p><p>But she was never able to be happy for long enough. Every time Abed mentioned his girlfriend (which was pretty rare) she’d become sad again. Now that she’d begun to see Abed in such a different light, it made her feel upset. Kind of like when Britta and Jeff were trying to date but even worse somehow.</p><p>She loved it every time she remembered how good Abed felt when he kissed her and she hated it every time she remembered that it was just some Star Wars themed roleplaying. She absolutely hated it with a red hot sizzling hatred, more red hot and sizzling than anyone could ever imagine and she didn’t know what to do. Annie would never be an obstacle in Abed’s love life. She’d never be so unethical as to make a move on him while he was in a relationship and since Britta and Shirley would “aww” every time Abed’s girlfriend was brought up, she had to “aww” too.</p><p>She didn’t know how to overlook it either, the look he gave her when he found out she made out with Jeff. She was probably scrutinizing it, there was probably nothing in that look but somehow it felt different, it didn’t portray disapproval alone, it had a tinge of hurt and she could sense it when it was with someone who showed emotions as scarcely as Abed did.</p><p>Slowly, she started getting sadder more and more easily. There was something different in the way how Annie Edison functioned. She took every form of kindness from a seemingly attractive fellow as a sign of attraction because while growing up, no one was kind to her. She thought it was so rare that she’d formed a wrong impression and she did try to get rid of it but it was hard. She always felt stupid when she just started assuming some guy was into her just because he was down to earth and mellow. Rich, she thought, was flirting with her just because he was being easygoing and chill and just nice and himself. Jeff, she thought, was into her because he saved her when he saw her almost fall down or get choked.</p><p>Abed, however, lived with her and even though he wasn’t technically a “nice gentleman”, he was genuinely sweet and always sensed when her mood was off. Even though he was uncomfortable when he had to help others with their problems, he’d always help her, ask her if she wanted to talk. He called himself a student of human character and thus he could easily sense if Annie was feeling down and then he’d ask her if she wanted to talk about it. How could she? All she wanted to say was, “dump your girlfriend and kiss me right now.” and who knew how he’d react. He’d freak out and it would take forever for him to ever want to talk to her.</p><p>All of a sudden, she heard Abed’s voice saying her name and got startled, “hey Annie, do you have an extra graphite lead that I could put in my mechanical pencil?”</p><p>She nodded. “What size lead do you need?”</p><p>“0.7 mm” he clarified.</p><p>She needed to stop doing this. Being startled whenever she heard his voice.</p><p>“Abed, so are you bringing your girlfriend to the dance next week?” Shirley asked in her normal sweet tone.</p><p>“I haven’t asked her yet but I’m pretty sure she will want to come.” Abed replied.</p><p>“Uh, are you sure it’s a romantic dance?” Annie asked with fake curiosity.</p><p>“Annie, it’s a dance. Of course it’s romantic.” Britta said.</p><p>“Yeah sorry” she chuckled. Why did she even have to ask? She hoped nobody noticed her expression or her tone and started fake studying.</p><p>“Guys, it’s already 5, I’m heading home.” Jeff said.</p><p>“Yeah me too” Britta mumbled.</p><p>“Yeah, I gotta help with dinner” Shirley said.</p><p>“I need to bang a few chicks” Pierce boasted.</p><p>“Ew, Pierce!”</p><p>“Okay, Annie, let’s go”</p><p>And like that, hearing Abed’s voice say her name did things to her yet again. It made butterflies somersault in her stomach and made her cheeks flush.</p><p>“Yeah let’s go.”</p><p>“Uh, if you don’t mind, Troy and Abed, I’d like to speak with Annie regarding something important.” Britta said suddenly.</p><p>“You would?” Annie asked.</p><p>“Will you guys take long?” Troy asked, an almost complain forming in his tone.</p><p>“Yeah, it might, you guys should go on home, I’ll drive her home.” Britta offered.</p><p>“Yeah, okay” Annie said, still clueless as to what Britta was getting at.</p><p>“Cool. Cool cool cool.” Abed said.</p><p>He walked off with Troy.</p><p>And his voice made her get flustered all over again for reasons she couldn’t begin to comprehend.</p><p>***</p><p>“Something you wanna talk to me about, Annie?” Britta asked her as they sat in her cat.</p><p>“No, what are you talking about?” Annie asked with fake curiosity.</p><p>“Well, you know, beating around the bush is something I don’t believe in so I want to talk about Abed.”</p><p>“What about him?”</p><p>“Your feelings about him! Are you seriously telling me that your face isn’t getting all pink when he says a random word and you’re questioning if a dance is romantic or not out of jealousy? You’re into him!”</p><p>“Britta, maybe I am but he’s taken! It’s not like I can do anything about it.”</p><p>“You can talk to me, Annie,” Britta said as she was just taking a turn to reach apartment 303, “it doesn’t even take a psych student to know that you can confide with someone. If you feel you’re having complex feelings, you can come to me anytime.”</p><p>“Thanks.” Annie smiled, “I think that’ll help.”</p><p>“Hey!” Britta smiled back at her, “Anytime.”</p><p>With that, Annie left the car and headed on upstairs to get to her room</p><p>***</p><p>Annie preferred doing her biology homework in the living room for a change. Usually, Troy and Abed would be playing games or watching TV but today, there was some peace and she’d been just looking at Abed while she was supposed to be doing her homework. She freshened up and sat on the dining table with her textbook and her notebook.</p><p>***</p><p>After half an hour, Abed came in looking droopy, accompanied by a fuming Troy.</p><p>“Hey guys,” Annie said cheerfully till she saw the expression on their faces, “what happened?”</p><p>“Abed’s [redacted] girlfriend was making out with some [redacted] guy.” Troy sobbed. “How could she?”</p><p>“Troy, it’s okay. That’s what my life is supposed to be like.” Abed said glumly.</p><p>“Abed I’m so sorry, ” Annie said, “and don’t say that! Your life is supposed to be amazing and great. That’s what her life is supposed to be like” Annie said.</p><p>“Yeah” Troy agreed. His phone beeped. “Damn it, I forgot about my football practice. But I can ditch it and we can hate on Stacey.”</p><p>“No, you go on ahead,” Abed said. “You’ve got a tournament coming up.”</p><p>“Yeah, Troy, I’ve got this.” Annie looked at him. Troy looked back, his eyes shone with understanding and a sense of gratitude.</p><p>“Okay, bye, I’ll be back in about three hours or so.” he said.</p><p>***</p><p>“You wanna watch a movie?” Annie said, as she boiled some pasta and heated some cocoa mix.</p><p>“Sure.” he said.</p><p>“Which one?”</p><p>“Whichever” he said glumly.</p><p>She didn’t like this version of Abed. He was sad and she just knew instinctively that Abed being sad was something that would make her cry. She pulled herself together.</p><p>“You know, let’s watch As Good As It Gets, I’ve heard great things about that one”</p><p>“Yeah, me too”</p><p>She tried for a smile and put the movie on.</p><p>***</p><p>Halfway through the movie, Annie realized that she put this movie up on purpose without even realizing it. She had read about the movie earlier and she knew the plot and even though watching As Good As It Gets was a random idea, she knew it was a subconscious decision. A movie about a socially awkward guy with OCD who wrote romance novels and had trouble understanding people getting close to a normal woman. Of course, it didn’t fully resemble what Abed and she were like in any regard. Abed wasn’t even a quarter as mean as Jack Nicholson’s character and their age difference wasn’t as eighth as big and weird.</p><p>She started to notice a few things as the movie went on though. After putting their dirty dishes of comfort food aside, she had snuggled close to Abed. Much closer than she could ever imagine. And he had his arms around her, protectively but gently. She felt nice. And safe. And cared for. She was sure he would never let Britta get this close to her.</p><p>The best part was that as she snuggled closer and closer to him, he tugged her closer and closer too while looking at her for a second and looking back up at the screen. He was aware, not subconscious. Butterflies fluttered in her stomach. And as the credits finally started rolling after Melvin Udall was casually walking the streets calmly with Carol Connelly instead of miserably living in his tiny apartment, their eyes met for too long.</p><p>Way too long. Longer than anytime her eyes met with Jeff’s.</p><p>They stared intently at each other and before she could get into some sort of an inner monologue, she started leaning in. And he complied, slowly, steadily. She, overtaken by her impulse bridged the gap between them, fast. She didn’t want some door knock or some buzzing phone or some oven timer buzzing as their faces were covered with frosting to just have them lingering with an almost kiss, leaving things unattended forever but knowing there was something.</p><p>And that kiss was amazing.</p><p>Somehow, even better than the Han Solo one.</p><p>It was so amazing. It was so great. It was his arms around her waist, slowly making their way up to her soft hair. It was her arms around his neck, on their way to cup his jaw. It was what you’d call an electrifying kiss.</p><p>They weren’t playing characters this time. They were fully aware of what they were doing.</p><p>But they needed to breathe. They needed to gather their breath. She was scared that it’d stop but they kissed again. Softer. Sweeter. Longer.</p><p> </p><p>But they needed to breath again. This time, however, they couldn’t start. Before they could lean in again, they heard the door opening.</p><p>Troy was home.</p><p>“Hey guys, how are you Abed?”</p><p>“Considerably better.” he said, smiling at Annie.</p><p>Troy looked at Annie with an expression of gratitude while she returned it with an expression of “thanks for going to the football practice but like couldn’t you have gone for longer?”.</p><p>She actually felt happy for the first time in months.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>okay I had fun, it was cool and I hope you enjoyed the ending today too :)</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. The Future</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Summary for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
            <p>We're situated two weeks after the last chapter. Annie and Abed deal with the repercussions of getting lost in the moment.</p>
          </blockquote><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I guess this is it.<br/>This is my first fic exceeding 10k words so that's sick</p><p>Thanks for being here and showing love :)</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <h3>Abed</h3><p>What had happened two weeks ago?</p><p>Abed had no clue. His brain after a long time was all over the place. He kissed Annie. More than once. Out of character. And he didn’t want it to stop. He kept re-playing in his head how it happened. She came closer, he let her. He went closer to her. They were draped under the same blanket. And the movie was ending. He looked at her and she looked at him for 2 minutes straight. If this was in the study room, someone would’ve broken the ice, but in front of the TV in their apartment, there was no interruption. Then they started to lean in. He more hesitantly, she more boldly. So apparently, she was into this.</p><p>This seemed to be something completely unplanned. Something out of the blue. And Abed knew he didn’t like that. He liked TV- logic, rules and structure. Not getting lost in the moments and eye contacts. Abed knew he didn’t like that but he liked this. He liked this way too much. Way more than he liked TV, if he were being honest with himself and that was just strange. He was sure he liked Annie in a way that was in no regards structural or logical. He was using his heart instead of his head and that was the newest thing he’d ever experienced. He liked that but he also didn’t. “Darn it,” he thought, “I’m becoming Troy.”</p><p>One more thought that seemed to linger in his brain was that two weeks ago, it felt less like a show and more like reality. Not reality, even, some sort of fan-fiction that a no good person thought of writing because the person was bored and now the writer was just needlessly stalling to find some sort of resolution but couldn’t.</p><p>For the longest time he’d been running scenarios in the Dreamatorium while Troy was practicing football and what he saw was happiness for others and sadness for himself. Annie’d end up with Jeff. Maybe she did in all the other timelines. He knew for sure they’d be ‘endgame’ in the one where Jeff went to get the pizza. He wanted to call that the prime timeline since that would be the one where Abed’s brain would be fast enough to deduce Jeff’s method of there being no probability of Jeff getting the pizza.</p><p>That would be the ideal timeline for everyone. Especially for Jeff. In that timeline, he thought, he’d never get married and live alone forever. This one was ideal for him. He could be with Annie all he wanted and Jeff won’t be that bothered. Of course, it would be possible that feelings would re-kindle in him for Annie but he trusted Jeff enough after three years to not disrupt his friends’ happiness and he trusted Annie enough to not relapse into her non-platonic affection for Jeff while she was with him, Abed.</p><p>Exam were two days away. His first exam was Film and Annie’s first exam was Hospital Administration (though she’d muse about taking Forensics once in a while). So they’d be studying. Both Annie and Abed were passionate and serious about their fields so they’d be busy studying. They’d spend till 8 pm in school, studying on weekdays with their respective friends from their different classes.</p><p>On weekends, both would study but since Troy was also around, memorizing lines for an individual monologue performance from Antigone, Annie and Abed could not talk about the recent change. The altercation or possibly the enhancement in their own personal dynamic. After having studied way too long about Hitchcock’s film making technique that he used in Psycho, he needed a mental getaway. He went to the Dreamatorium to run a few scenarios</p><p>***</p><p>He had a house. It was a nice house. It had a nice porch and a backyard and a very nice kitchen. He had various shelves of movies but also some beautiful bedsheet and ceramics. He’d just woken up from bed, wearing an engagement ring. He’d woken up next to Annie. She noticed as he twisted and turned as he woke up and she woke up with him. “Mm…good morning, honey…” she smiled, she pulled him in for a morning kiss which he gladly gave her. “Morning, Annie.” he smiled back at her, kissing her once again on her forehead. Before he could walk out of his bedroom, an eight year old boy smiled at him, “Good morning dad!”, “Good morning, Chester!” he greeted his son, ruffling his hair. “Good morning, darling.” Annie also greeted their son, as she woke up from her bed, “would you like to have some hot chocolate?”. “Yes, mom!”. “Okay, sweetheart, I’m on it…”</p><p>The only feeling Abed could associate with this scenario was bliss. Utmost bliss. This was new. Now, somehow, it felt achievable.</p><p>***</p><p>Abed opened his textbook to study the importance of lighting and how it affects certain scenes and helps in emphasizing and establishing certain elements important to a specific film as he tried to tone out thoughts regarding his recent visit to the Dreamatorium . It was hard and again something quite new. Something he had no experience with. The moment he’d get out of the Dreamatorium, it wouldn’t take him any effort to get back on track but this time, he had trouble focusing. Troy was outside, learning how to pronounce certain words for his monologue with the help of some text-to-speech website. Garrity took exams seriously.</p><p>And then he looked up at his calendar where he observed that the dance was there just two days after his film exam which was also his last one. He’d totally forgotten about that. He decided he wouldn’t go because there was no point in going all the way there and then feeling sad and alone about other things. He’d go if Troy went because he’d probably go with Britta, though. He didn’t think it’d be impossible getting a last minute date but it was impossible thinking of getting a date after his experience with Annie.</p><p>He didn’t know what to do. He was more or less helpless. He decided to answer some questions from a sample test. All of them were easy-peasy so it didn’t take him long to do them.</p><p>Fifteen minutes after he was done, Troy popped in.</p><p>“Hey, I’m finally done with Antigone!”, Troy said</p><p>“Cool cool cool. I just finished my studies too!”, Abed responded.</p><p>“So…”</p><p>“Should we go to the Dreamatorium?”</p><p>“Nah, I wanna talk”</p><p>“Cool. What?”</p><p>“You and Annie”</p><p>“Huh?”</p><p>“Don’t try to act smart with me. What’s going on with you and Annie? Why did it look like I was walking in on you two making out?”</p><p>“I don’t know what you mean.” Abed said with a stutter.</p><p>That was it, Abed thought. Troy knew him well enough to know that Abed never really fumbled for words. He always had an answer and was never really a good liar. And Abed was right. Troy did figure <em>that</em> Out.</p><p>“Fine. Go to your Dreamatorium” Troy said angrily.</p><p>Abed didn’t want Troy to be mad at him. He had absolutely no idea what happened between Annie and him but he didn’t want to lose Troy as a friend either.</p><p>“Okay, Troy, I will tell you something confidential.” Abed finally relented.</p><p>“What?” Troy asked. His frown fading, his voice turning animatedly excited.</p><p>“Since this is confidential, I’m going to have to ask you to not characteristically say what you’re thinking out loud in front of Pierce or Britta or anyone for that matter.”</p><p>“Yes.” Troy said, seemingly without thinking.</p><p>Abed hoped he wasn’t making a mistake by confiding in Troy. Troy was an amazing friend, no doubt. In spite of that, he had a serious problem with keeping his thoughts to himself, however interesting or weird they were. He decided he trusted Troy, though. He had to trust someone. This heartsick, emotional phase Abed was going through seemed abnormal and he needed a way out of it. Maybe like Britta used to say to appear smart, confiding was important.</p><p>“We did kiss.” Abed finally confirmed.</p><p>(it seemed like ‘finally’ since Troy had been looking at him, anticipating, for what looked like a long time)</p><p>“I knew it!” Troy said, in a whisper. “So what are you going to do about it?”</p><p>“What do you mean, Troy?”</p><p>“You kissed her, dude, you’re not gonna follow up? I had freaking eye contact with Britta and we’re dating, you literally made out with a girl and you’re not even thinking about doing something, y’know, next level!”</p><p>“We’ve made out before.” Abed waved his hand uncertainly, “though we were being different characters from Star Wars and it was a life and death scenario?”</p><p>“Dude, what kind of adventures do you have?” Troy said, now jealous, “first,  you’re hanging out with Secret Service Agents and now you’re in life and death scenarios pretending to be in Star Wars? Why do I never get to do this awesome stuff.” he mumbled, complaining.</p><p>“It was paintball.”</p><p>“Oh.” he said, comparatively less annoyed and jealous. “Oh yeah, paintball was dope last summer. Can’t believe how I–” Troy stopped talking and frowned.</p><p>“What happened, Troy?”</p><p>“Nice try. It may have worked earlier but it won’t work this time, stop trying to change this topic. You have to do something about Annie.”</p><p>“Why?”</p><p>“Because you like her and she likes you.”</p><p>“How can you be so sure that she likes me?”</p><p>“Because Britta asked Annie how she felt about you and she literally responded the exact same way you did.”</p><p>“That doesn’t prove anything.”</p><p>“Why would she knowingly kiss you out of character if she wasn’t into you?”</p><p>“You’re probably right, Troy but it’s not like I can do anything. We’ll go out, she’ll get tired of me and my constant movie references and would want to be with someone normal.”</p><p>“Shut up with that crap. You’re straight up making excuses.”</p><p>“Okay, fine. What should I do?”</p><p>“Ask her out! Duh-doy!”</p><p>“I don’t know…” Abed said trailing off. Thinking about his recent vision in the Dreamatorium.</p><p>He opened his phone.</p><p> </p>
<hr/>
<h3>Annie</h3><p>And so it was that she didn’t know what to do.</p><p> </p><p>She’d been studying day-in and day-out but one thought would always occur to her. What happened? And why didn’t it stick? Her feelings for Abed had recently been very complicated and she’d finally done something about it. She felt happy while kissing him and after kissing him but as they got less and less time to spend with each other, things just became awkward. Recently, her whole outlook towards two people had changed.</p><p>Earlier, she’d begun to think that she could be with Jeff. Jeff had evolved quite a lot as a human to be with her, he’d help her and be nice and sweet to her ever since the student body election and she’d thought that maybe if they went out, she could turn Jeff to an even better person. She could be his princess… And she’d smile thinking about it.</p><p>Then she said what she said.</p><p>She knew Jeff was insecure about the exact thing she said and she chided herself the moment she said it. She knew it was more or less true and she still would’ve thought it but then again, she was pretty sure that with time and development on her part, the weird dynamic she had with Jeff would change. She’d grow older and more mature and he’d start respecting her as an adult. Since the model UN thing, he’d even stopped calling her ‘kid’ and that ignited some hope in her but after having said that, she was sure they couldn’t grow past it after hearing it come out of Annie’s own mouth. She knew she couldn’t. If she hadn’t said it, she could’ve grown past it eventually and he would’ve too. But now? Chances were slim to none.</p><p>Then she looked at Abed’s disappointed face. If looks could penetrate think into your skull and give you chills…that’s how she felt. Chills running up and down her body as he’d looked at her during the night of his housewarming party. Not with plainly just disapproval but with pain. Sheer pain. And she saw something. Flashbacks ensued shortly afterwards. She’d surely kissed Abed but in paintball but she knew it was a fluke. That it was ‘role-playing’. That ‘the context demanded it’ and so she dropped it. She thought about it long enough but she definitely knew she had to drop it or it would just be needless.</p><p>The paintball kiss was different from the transfer formal kiss with Jeff. The latter, they were more conscious and aware of themselves- it was reality. The former was merely a dream and it being a dream hurt more than she could imagine. She couldn’t believe how long it had been a dream for until…until…</p><p>
  <em>He looked at her like that.</em>
</p><p>During the party and the movie. He leaned in during the movie. He wasn’t being anyone apart from himself and thus he knew what he was doing and she knew what she was doing and there was absolutely no layer of illusion on it this time. Hence, more awkward.</p><p>On a different note, hospital administration was kind of boring. She was reading on how to implement clinical policies and procedures so as to become an adept hospital administrator but slowly and gradually, her interest in the subject seemed to be dropping. She remembered and memorized everything because she was sure of her career path but lately, after having attended some movie nights with Troy and Abed last month, she’d been thinking a bit about forensics but she didn’t want the group to treat her the way they did Britta when she wanted to become a therapist and thus pursue psychology. She didn’t talk about it but she always did think about it.</p><p>She decided to do some end of text questions to make sure she knew enough.</p><p>***</p><p>Annie had just finished attempting the end of text question when she saw a text from Britta.</p><p>“Hey, Annie, my internet is kind of down, how do you spell pcsychology?”</p><p>Annie rolled her eyes.</p><p>“PSYCHOLOGY” she texted back, smiling.</p><p>“Thabsks” Britta texted back.</p><p>Annie frowned. She hoped this was a typo and that she wasn’t accidentally reading what could be Pierce’s texts.</p><p>“Thanks*” Britta texted again.</p><p>Annie breathed a sigh of relief. It was all cool.</p><p>“So, what are you doing with Abed?” another text.</p><p>“What do you mean?” Annie texted back. Not confused. Vexed.</p><p>“Troy told me what happened with his [redacted] girlfriend Stacey. I never knew he could curse like a sailor.”</p><p>“Oh yes, she was quite a grinch, but what do you mean?”</p><p>“Seize the day, Annie, carpe diem!”</p><p>Annie frowned once again. She was scared now that she was texting Professor Whitman which was weird since she didn’t have his number.</p><p>She didn’t respond for a while until she got another text.</p><p>“Don’t ignore me. Do something.”</p><p>“Do what? What if he freaks out or bluntly rejects me with some poppycock about messing up the paradigm of the group and some leading lady/alpha male/comic relief crap?”</p><p>“ngl, that is a big doozy but you gotta try. If it doesnt work, just say you were doing a line from a movie or something.”</p><p>Annie thought about it for a second but she was unsure on what to do so she just wrote, “idk…” as she thought what it would be like if Abed didn’t actually reject her.</p><p>***</p><p>It was 9 pm and she’d still not had any dinner. Lately, they’d just been making some frozen food whenever they were hungry since they didn’t think they had enough time to deal with a collective dinner. Abed and Troy’s plates already were stacked up on the ‘washed dishes’ basket. She smiled. She loved how they didn’t force her to do dishes or something because that’d be really sexist and she didn’t have the mind to deal with that kind of crap from her best friends.</p><p>She didn’t feel like frozen pizza or Kraft’s Mac and Cheese so she simply just decided to have some Honey Nut Cheerios which she had a hard time enjoying because she’d think of the Rich and Jeff thing unceremoniously and that would tip her off.</p><p>“Powered by honey nut seri-os”</p><p>if Abed was right about their life being a show, Annie could see the imaginary watcher either laughing or cringing but she certainly wasn’t. Rich was also a dark chapter in her life. She wasn’t exactly going after Rich to rub it in Jeff’s face, she just liked how simply sweet he was. But then again, she was too young.</p><p>She hated that.</p><p>Like so much.</p><p>She wouldn’t usually use the word ‘hate’ to describe anything but this. How annoying it felt when someone she pined after straight up told her that she was too young. Abed wouldn’t surely do that. She knew he wasn’t a 30 something year old virgin because he was born in 1987 and he’d dated quite a few girls from what she’d gathered. Still that was immaterial, she didn’t want any rejections. She decided to give it up once and for all.</p><p>She’d already resolved not to go to the dance that was happening next month due to what she thought were obvious reasons. She didn’t want all sorts of couples dancing around while she was alone in some weird plastic chair, listening to some lame songs the Dean put on. Maybe now that she’d given up on Jeff, the Dean would think the coast was clear and start going after Jeff. She smiled. Now that was something worth smiling about.</p><p>She quietly sipped the rest of the milk and quickly cleaned her purple bowl, retreating to her room.</p><p>Afterwards she’d positively think she was dreaming as her phone buzzed once again.</p><p>“Great.” she thought. “Another stupid text from Britta about how she should be going after what she desired”</p><p>It wasn’t Britta who texted her. Neither was it Jeff or Troy or Whitman or Pierce or Shirley or whoever.</p><p>It was Abed from the next room.</p><p>“Would you like to go to the dance with me?” it read</p><p>After replying “yes”, she pinched herself but interestingly, this was NOT a dream.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I'm thinking of a sequel...we'll see...<br/>I'm thinking of taking a break from like fic writing in general till September because I live in a country with a different education system where mid-terms happen at the wrong time. Till then, Imma just read so yeah.<br/>:)</p><p>Also super thanks to le awesome discord server for supporting me even though they don't like A/A that much. If you feel like you're stuck in a fic or something, you should come join us, they're plenty of us in there :))</p>
        </blockquote><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>thanks to a super awesome discord server for a little help and support.</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>